How many African American skeletons are being kept in museums across the United States? How many of these are from persons who sold their bodies to science? How many are from archaeological sites? How many were procured at some distant time in the past when antiquarians, medical schools, and archaeologists […]
The San Francisco Bay Area has a unique history based on the role it’s played in shaping the United States. It’s history isn’t always pretty, but it is what makes the Bay Area unique. Echoes of the past are still visible. The landscape was shaped by the fires of Bay […]
When I was a child, my mother always told my brother, sister, and I that we would never take care of anything we didn’t have to pay for ourselves. It was true. The G.I. Joes I got for Christmas? They got broken and discarded within months of Santa’s sleigh landing. […]
We didn’t choose for things to end up the way they are in cultural resource management archaeology, but we can choose to change them. I’ve only been a CRMer for a decade or so. I’ve seen things change for the worse but, these days, it looks like things are on […]
Who would have ever thought a 5-year-old would be enthusiastic about seeing a pile of rocks in the desert? No toys. No playground. Just an 800-year-old archaeological ruin…and a little sister. This last weekend, I took a National Parks and Monuments tour with my wife and kids through northern Arizona. […]
I just got done watching “The Martian” and, seeing how I’m a Matt Damon fan already, I liked it. But, then again, I pretty much always like any science-based movies depicting humans colonizing other planets (especially Mars). As an archaeologist, it’s not hard for me to ponder the future of […]
For a person who is building a career based on the study of human beings, I have to confess: I really don’t like other people. The main problem with other people is they aren’t me. They have their own lives, thoughts, experiences, and perspectives that differ with the way I […]
Historic preservation-minded developer Bill Naito didn’t just save buildings. He helped create ambiance, character, and augmented the quality of life in downtown Portland, Oregon. During the 1960s, Naito saw potential in the rotting waterfront warehouses. He realized that remodeling these buildings may not immediately improve property values, increase foot traffic, […]
Feast or Famine is a frequently acknowledged part of being a CRM archaeologist. Because many of our companies are so poorly managed, they live and die by close-ended, temporary cultural resources contracts. The company goes into the toilet if the management is unable to land contracts. When the project flow […]
This last weekend, my family and I volunteered at another public archaeology event spearheaded by a prominent Arizona historical society. It was the final field session of the project I discussed in my post that discussed how to involve minorities in archaeology by introducing them to the science at an […]
